The Yes Men : Fix The World

It's difficult not to be cynical about how “big business” treats the subject of ethics in today's world. In many corporations, where the

It's difficult not to be cynical about how “big business” treats the subject of ethics in today's world. In many corporations, where the

Enron was an energy trading and communications company located in Houston, Texas. During 1996-2001 Enron was given the name of America’s Most Innovative Company by Fortune magazine as it was the seventh-largest corporation in the US. The problem that led this company to bankruptcy was due to the fact that fraudulent accounting practices took place allowing Enron to overstate their earnings and tuck away their high debt liabilities in order to have a more appealing balance sheet (Forbes.com, 2002). Enron’s accounting team “cooked” the books to every meaning of the word so that their investors would not see anything wrong with the failing organization. This poorly structured company led people to jail time, unemployment, and caused retirement stocks to be dried up. Enron had a social responsibility to its stockholders and rather than being up front and honest about the failing company they hid every financial flaw in order to keep receiving money from its investors. By Enron not keeping a social

Based on the information presented in the PBS documentary and the TIME article, describe how the behaviors of corporations, such as Ford, Firestone, and the financial institutions on Wall Street, could or should be understood as crime whether or not they have been prosecuted? How do these activities differ from those involved in “typical” street crimes?

Describe the “proxy system” and how is it used to as activism to encourage companies to “go green.”

The word “fraud” was magnified in the business world around the end of 2001 and the beginning of 2002. No one had seen anything like it. Enron, one of the country’s largest energy companies, went bankrupt and took down with it Arthur Andersen, one of the five largest audit and accounting firms in the world. Enron was followed by other accounting scandals such as WorldCom, Tyco, Freddie Mac, and HealthSouth, yet Enron will always be remembered as one of the worst corporate accounting scandals of all time. Enron’s collapse was brought upon by the greed of its corporate hierarchy and how it preyed upon its faithful stockholders and employees who invested so much of their time and money into the company. Enron seemed to portray that the goal of corporate America was to drive up stock prices and get to the peak of the financial mountain by any means necessary. The “Conspiracy of Fools” is a tale of power, crony capitalism, and company greed that lead Enron down the dark road of corporate America.

Corporate transgressions continue to occur in the United States every day and are a form of violence. Take for example the case of UrbanCore Development, LLC. Recently the real estate development firm has been in the news mostly for the local protests the company has sparked by signing a deal to purchase public lands from the city of Oakland. Their website, www.urbancorellc.com states, “UrbanCore emphasizes partnerships between the public, private, and community sectors, and is known for successfully bring these groups together to complete projects. The result of these public-private relationships is that UrbanCore is able to enhance the feasibility of the private investment in its transactions by leveraging the public investment contributions in each project.” I find this interesting considering the company is coming under fire for lying about the future availability of low income housing in it’s proposed development off of 12th Street near Lake Merritt. The deal that they have created would oust elderly Asian people from their homes with nowhere to go and no plans for relocating the elders. The company has also come under fire for lying about contributions it made to Mayor Libby Schaff’s campaign. Records have surfaced that may prove that the campaign contributions that UrbanCore made were

The stakeholders in this fraudulent case of WorldCom consist of Bernie Ebbers, Scott Sullivan, Buford Yates, David Myers, Cynthia Cooper, and Betty Vinson belong to the company. While the other stakeholders would consist of the creditors, Andersen (accounting firm), investors, and the public. This fraudulent act committed within WorldCom impacted every single stakeholder in a way. Either in a negative or positive way, most of the impact was caused with harm to everyone. The main individuals such as Ebbers, Sullivan, and Vinson all had major consequences as resulting with the fraud. Criminal trials were a major result with their fraudulent acts within WorldCom. Cooper was a lifesaver by most of the community. Aside from these individuals, the rest also got affected by the fraud. Investments conducted by the investors were all lost within the fraud process. The impact towards much of the image for Andersen was ruined. Many of the public lost their trust on the honesty and professionalism of Andersen and other certified public accounting firms. The entire employees from the top management to the smaller group of workers stayed unemployed and some with criminal punishment.

In the book, The Corporation Joel Bakan presents arguments, that corporations are nothing but institutional pathological psychopaths that are “a dangerous possessor of the great power it wields over people and societies.” Their main responsibility is maximizing profit for their stockholders and ignoring the means to achieve this goal, portrays them as “psychopathic.” Bakan argues that, corporations are psychopaths, corporate social responsibility is illegal, and that corporations are able to manipulate anyone, even the government.

Enron was named the most admired company for six years in a row, and it was widely considered one of the best companies to work for by Fortune magazine. Enron shocked the world, and it's stockholders when it was revealed at the end of 2001 that the company’s “reported financial condition was sustained substantially by institutionalized, systematic, and creatively planned accounting fraud”. (Enron, 2011, para. 1) Enron maximized it’s long-run profits for itself, but not within the limits of the law. Enron disregarded it’s social responsibility to it’s stackholders when the company only strive for it’s maximized profits, and didn’t strive

This deception on behalf of the executives and others in the organization who hid this vastly affected anyone who had stock in Enron as well as stock in other energy corporations. The

As the turn of the 21st Century evolved, it appeared as if Adelphia Communications Corporation was on a direct path of success; unbeknownst to their investors and the public, they were in reality on a direct path of destruction instead. Unfortunately, Adelphia is not the first major company in the history of the United States’ business world to lose the trust of the American public, but it is certainly one of the most notable ones to do so. As the events surrounding the Adelphia scandal unfolded in full view of the public eye, a multitude of media outlets were there to broadcast the destruction and distrust to the masses leaving many wondering if the term “business ethics” was actually nothing more than just an oxymoron. Throughout this

In the book, The Corporation Joel Bakan, presents arguments: that corporations are nothing but institutional pathological psychopaths that are “a dangerous possessor of the great power it wields over people and societies.” Their main responsibility is maximizing profit for their stockholders and ignoring the means to achieve this goal. This in results portrays them as “psychopathic.” Bakan argues that: corporations are psychopaths, corporate social responsibility is illegal, and that corporations are able to manipulate anyone, even the government.

Since corporations are not physical things or people, it is very easy for them to avoid any kind of trouble. Corporations have become great at passing on their externalities to the public. An externality is an expense of any kind, whether it is something such as environmental damage or forcing people in an area to pay money for something, that a corporation forces the public to pay for while they privatize all profits. Corporations being externalizing machines fit in very well with their psychopathic behavior. They externalize any cost to the public because they can and it helps them achieve their goal of making as much money as possible. A quote from Robert Monks puts it very well, he says “The corporation is an externalizing machine

The overwhelming facts point to a shady underworld of self-dealing and opportunistic exploitation of the poor and working class, which was until recently, well hidden from the commoner. The executives of WorldCom and Enron provide real world examples of unethical business practices, where the desire to make money for their shareholders transcended into an addiction to greed and self-dealing that were displayed by their, “excessive pay, perks, and golden parachutes”(Carson 392) at the expense of all stakeholders. All is not lost, there are corporations that pride themselves in their sound business model and commitment to ethical business practices. Such companies as Eaton Corporation, and Weyerhaeuser, who according to Ethisphere.com, a business ethics watchdog, are among the “2010 World`s most ethical companies.” (Ethisphere)